hey i completely agree with do you??

O.K. speaking of netiquette, there is something that bugs me to distraction. I see it a lot with newbies. A new member, in his/her first post, will ask for help with a personal problem. The story behind the question is written in extensive, and usually unnecessary, detail.There are many run on sentences.

Now for the part that really gets to me. The post will usually have no paragraphs to break up the thoughts into coherent chunks.


That kind of writing drives me nuts!

Phoenix--

I agree. I like to measure out the milk of human kindness to complete sentences and coherent paragraphs.

Ever noticed how often monumental egoists refer to themselves as "i"?

Yup. And many do not use proper punctuation, and will use all small letters. I have often got the feeling from a number of these sorts of posts, that it is "stream of consciousness writing". I often conclude that the writer is so self involved, that he/she really does not care how the writing impacts on other people.

Then again, we have a lot of people here from Boston. I don't remember if it was Dear Abby or Ann Landers, but one of them used to say that they could spot a joke question from the Yalies a mile away. We may be getting some of them!

I think that kind of shorthand is common amongst lawyers...for a variety of reasons.

Isn't that what Noddy just said, Miller? Monumental
egoists?

I totally agree
Phoenix - It was Ann Landers.

Additional thoughts on paragraphing: (1) A paragraph serves to move on to another thought or another aspect, amplification, or clarification of the previous paragraph; and (2) it makes reading a long spiel a heck of a lot easier. That in itself should be sufficient reason for breaking up posts into paragraphs.

Frankly, if I see a lengthy unbroken post I tend to skip it altogether, and I would assume that others have the same reaction. All of which means that the poster may not get all the responses he/she might otherwise get.